Cuba's Competing Processes are Succession vs Transition: A conversation with Professors Jaime Suchlicki and Carlos Eire on May 27, 2021

Will Cuba's dictatorship be the first communist regime to not survive beyond the founding generation?

A conversation with Professors Jaime Suchlicki and Carlos Eire

• Transition is understood as the gradual replacement of an autocratic regime by a democratic political order.
  
• Succession denotes changes of power within the boundaries of a given regime.
• Communist Cuba is still ruled by leadership of the founding generation of the Castro dictatorship.
• Communist regimes around the world have continued beyond first generation leadership. Will Cuba's regime be different? 
  

Professor Carlos Eire 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Yale University scholar, writes often about Cuban politics and culture. His memoir Waiting for Snow in Havana received the National Book Award for Nonfiction. He is the author of several other books, including A Very Brief History of Eternity (Princeton University Press, 2010), and Reformations: The Early Modern World (Yale University Press, 2016).  

Professor Jaime Suchlicki  

The Director of the Cuban Studies Institute. Has written many articles and several books, including Cuba: From Columbus to Castro and Beyond (Potomac Books). Dr. Suchlicki is often interviewed by TV, radio, and printed media on Cuba and Latin American politics. One of his latest reports is Doing Business in Cuba: Investors Beware. 

Below is a copy of the advertisement circulated for the May 27, 2021 event with these two scholars.

 

How the Castro regime expanded misery in Cuba

Socialist governments traditionally do make a financial mess. They always run out of other people’s money. - Margaret Thatcher, February 5, 1976

November 14, 2019

A Publication of the Cuban Studies Institute
 
Impact of Socialism in Cuba 

 *By Jaime Suchlicki

One of the first economic measures introduced by the Castro revolution after 1959 was the 50% reduction in rents people paid for apartments and single-family residences. This Urban Reform Law was hailed as a victory for the lower and middle classes, and a measure that would stimulate the economy since now renters would have more money to spend.

The result was very different. The law had a snowballing effect on the economy. Investors in apartments and commercial real estate refused to further invest. The real estate industry was paralyzed. Cement plants, plumbing companies, wood manufacturing, electronic factories and many more related enterprises closed, many went bankrupt. The economy entered a period of stagnation which never to recovered.

Other “revolutionary” or socialist laws such as the “Agrarian Reform Law” which confiscated, without payment, privately own land had similar results, also the confiscation of large and small businesses produced an economic paralysis and threw hundreds of thousands of workers to the unemployment lines.

All these measures and actions of the government were accompanied by a demonization of capitalism, private enterprise and moneymaking. Business enterprises, as well as money, were considered evil. “Money is the evil intermediary” said Fidel Castro, “between what man produces and what man consumes.”

Two years after the beginning of the revolution the economy entered into a major down spiral. Massive unemployment developed; inflation became out of control; all commercial and industrial production was paralyzed.The country rapidly followed this socialist phase with a Marxist-Leninist period with rationing of most products, militarization of society, alliance with the Soviet Union, conflict with the United States and the migration of more than 2 million Cubans. The economy never recovered. The middle and upper classes were destroyed, and the workers joined the ranks of the unemployed,underemployed or of the state, working for miserable wages.

* Jaime Suchlicki, Professor Emeritus, University of Miami and Director and founder of the Cuban Studies Institute, CSI, a non-profit research group in Coral Gables, FL. He is the author of Cuba: From Columbus to Castro& Beyond, now in its 5th edition; Mexico: From Montezuma to the Rise of the PAN, 2nd edition, and Breve Historia de Cuba. 

Published by The Miami Herald, November 13, 2019

 https://cubanstudiesinstitute.us/principal/economic-impact-of-socialism-in-cuba/ 

Impacto económico del socialismo en Cuba

Una de las primeras medidas económicas introducidas por la revolución de Castro después de 1959 fue la reducción del 50% en los alquileres que los inquilinos pagaban por apartamentos y residencias unifamiliares. Esta Ley de Reforma Urbana fue aclamada como una victoria para las clases bajas y medias, y unamedida que estimularía la economía ya que ahora los inquilinos tendrían más dinero para gastar.

El resultado fue muy diferente. La ley tuvo un efecto negativo para la economía. Los inversores en apartamentos e inmuebles comerciales se negaron a seguir invirtiendo. La industria inmobiliaria se paralizó. Las plantas de cemento, las empresas de fontanería, la fabricación de madera, las fábricas electrónicas y muchas más empresas relacionadas cerraron, muchas se declararon en bancarrota. La economía entró en un período de estancamiento del que nunca se recuperó.

Otras leyes “revolucionarias” o socialistas como la “Ley de Reforma Agraria” que confiscaron, sin pago, tierras privadas tuvieron resultados similares, también la confiscación de grandes y pequeñas empresas produjo una parálisis económica y lanzó cientos de miles de trabajadores a las líneas de desempleo.

Todas estas medidas y acciones del gobierno fueron acompañadas de una demonización del capitalismo y la empresa privada. Los negocios, así como el dinero, se consideraban malvados. “El dinero es el intermediario malvado”, dijo Fidel Castro, “entre lo que el hombre produce y lo que el hombre consume”.

Dos años después del comienzo de la revolución, la economía entró en una gran espiral descendente. Se desarrolló un desempleo masivo; la inflación sedes controló; toda la producción comercial e industrial quedó paralizada. Elpaís siguió rápidamente esta fase socialista con un período marxista-leninista con racionamiento de la mayoría de los productos, militarización de la sociedad, alianza con la Unión Soviética, conflicto con los Estados Unidos y la migración de más de 2 millones de cubanos. La economía nunca se recuperó. Las clases medias y altas fueron destruidas, y los trabajadores se convirtieron en desempleados, subempleados o empleados del estado, trabajando por salarios miserables.

*Jaime Suchlicki es Director del Instituto de Estudios Cubanos, CSI, un grupo de investigación sin fines de lucroen Coral Gables, FL. Es el autor de Cuba: De Colón a Castro y más allá, ahora en su quinta edición; México: de Montezuma al ascenso del PAN, 2ª edición, y de Breve Historia de Cuba. 

Publicado en inglés por el Miami Herald, noviembre 13, 2019

https://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/article237308304.html

The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami is worth saving

"The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity." - William Butler Yeats, The Second Coming (1919)

Farewell Casa Bacardi?

 The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies (ICCAS) has been an important point of reference for Cuban Studies based at the University of Miami with an international reputation that debunked disinformation and misinformation about the regime in Cuba. In 2017 the Center has published authors and academics Dr. Jaime Suchlicki, Dr. José Azel and Dr. Pedro Roig heading ICCAS.

Dr. José Azel with Yoani Sanchez at ICCAS

 World renown author and journalist Carlos Alberto Montaner annually gives a series of community lectures on the history of Cuba that are heavily attended.  The Institute opened its doors both to the Cuban American community and the Cuban dissident movement on the island.  All voices and views were welcome in an atmosphere of rigorous academic exchange.

Dr. Jaime Suchlicki with Rosa María Payá

 The director of the Institute, Professor Jaime Suchlicki is the co-editor of the tenth edition of Cuban Communism. Reviewers of the 901 page tome say that it "has widely come to be known as 'the Bible of Cuban Studies.'" The distinguished periodical Foreign Affairs said of it: "There is no handier guide to the Castro regime and the debates swirling around it." Dr. Suchlicki wanted "to create a place where young Cuban-Americans could come and learn about Cuba’s history and culture,” and for the last 18 years he created that space at the University of Miami. This tradition of academic excellence and seeking out the facts has made it a long time target of the Castro regime.

The Hurricane used cover for Castro's 2016 death but appropriate today with ICCAS

 Mike Gonzalez, currently a senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation think tank, has written an important analysis of how foreign governments influence what Americans learn in college. The term "influence" is an understatement. He outlines how China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Cuba have successfully censored and propagandized what is taught at American colleges and universities.  The section of the article on Cuba described what is now taking place at the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies:

Long a thorn in the side of the communist dictatorship in Havana, ICCAS has constantly received vituperative attacks by the regime’s propaganda outlets. Never before, however, has it come under the threat of the university’s own leadership. Frenk is a long-standing and well-known admirer of the Cuban regime’s health practices. As Mexico’s health secretary in 2001, he said Cuba had the best health indicators in Latin America, and Mexico would benefit from learning about Cuba’s success.

Unfortunately for Frenk, the ICCAS kept saying the truth about Cuba’s failed health system, as it did on July 20 in a report called “Cuba’s Silence is Dangerous to Your Health.” That report notes that “After a century hiatus, cholera, malaria and dengue have returned to Cuba.” I post the report here because it seems to have disappeared from the ICCAS website. The move to close the ICCAS by Frenk, whose wife Felicia Knaul was installed as the university’s director of the Miami Institute of the Americas after he became president, proved highly controversial in Miami. He now says he never wanted to close the center at all, but only to change its leadership.

Frenk’s version of events is disputed by Jose Azel, one of the academics whom Jaime Suchliki, the esteemed ICCAS director, had to summarily dismiss when he was informed by the university’s provost on July 9 that he had to close the institute on August 15. In an article recently in El Nuevo Herald, The Miami Herald’s Spanish-language edition, Azel says “I have verified that Dr. Suchliki’s termination agreement explicitly requires him to ‘effect the cessation of operations for the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies’.”

When I passed by the Institute of Cuban and Cuban American Studies (ICCAS) last week the moving truck was there and the movers were carrying everything out.  Last month when conflicting accounts emerged about what would become of ICCAS my experience in dealing with University bureaucrats as an undergraduate led me to believe Dr. Suchlicki, the faculty member with a half century of dedicated scholarship and service to the community, over Dr. Julio Frenk, the newly arrived bureaucrat with a fondness for Cuba's totalitarian healthcare system.

Dr. Suchlicki has not abandoned his mission but will now continue it outside of the University of Miami and that is a great shame. The lack of candor and coverup by the UM administration is an even greater shame and another black eye for academia.

Panel organized by the Cuban Democratic Directorate in 2015

For the record I was proud to have participated in several panel discussions over the years at the  Institute of Cuban and Cuban American Studies (ICCAS) and mourn its passing at the University of Miami.

Keeping ICCAS at the University of Miami and maintaining the tradition of critical inquiry established by Dr. Suchlicki in 1999 is sorely needed in today's academic environment where academic freedom is under assault. I pray that this little platoon of society against all odds is maintained at the University of Miami. Today is supposedly Dr. Suchlicki's final day at the University of Miami after a half century of service. I hope that this will not be the case and that Professor Suchlicki will be able to continue and oversee the transition to new leadership that will keep his dream alive at the University of Miami.

Save The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami

"To be attached to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we belong to in society, is the first principle (the germ as it were) of public affections."  - Edmund Burke

An iconic South Florida institution, the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies (ICCAS) under threat of being radically transformed or closed at the University of Miami by an out of touch university bureaucracy.

The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies was established by the University of Miami and approved by the Faculty Senate in May of 1999. Over the next 18 years this institute has not only become a world-class academic center for research on Cubans and Cuban-Americans, an integral part of the Cuban cultural landscape in South Florida, and a gathering point for Cuban dissidents from the island  and Cubans in exile to nurture a democratic renaissance in Cuba.

Dr. Jaime Suchlicki, the Director of the Institute, in 2002 explained its importance in Veritas online: “Casa Bacardi is my dream come true. For years I have wanted to create a place where young Cuban-Americans could come and learn about Cuba’s history and culture.”

Dr. Suchlicki (left) and Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (center) 2002

This Institute is unique and unlike most other Cuban research centers around the country, that have been co-opted by the Castro regime into self-censorship and marginalization of dissenting voices, has embraced Cuban democrats and developed an organic relationship with the local Cuban-American community. News that ICCAS maybe closing its doors is generating both concern and outrage in the surrounding community.

Professor Jaime Suchlicki who has spent 50 years at the University of Miami said to El Nuevo Herald that his leaving "is not a retirement", but a "resignation" due to differences with UM President Julio Frenk over the future direction of Cuban studies at the university.

 Professor Suchlicki adds that "I am going to reestablish ICCAS somewhere else, possibly in the Museum of the Cuban Diaspora, and the staff is leaving with me,"

d more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article160633594.html#storylink=cpy

he added.

The University is now singing a different tune claiming that there are no plans of consolidating academic programs and the fortifying of institutional relations with Cuban universities. 

My experience in dealing with University bureaucracies and administrators as an undergraduate leads me to believe the faculty member with a half century of dedicated scholarship and service to the community over the newly arrived bureaucrat.

The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies must continue its good works and hopefully Dr. Jaime Suchlicki will reconsider his resignation as the director and oversee the transition in years to come to new leadership that will continue his good works.

The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies over the past 18 years has developed into "a little platoon" of society in South Florida that should be nurtured and preserved not radically altered to advance a narrow ideological agenda.

Read more here: http://www.elnuevoherald.com/noticias/sur-de-la-florida/article160564809.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.elnuevoherald.com/noticias/sur-de-la-florida/article160564809.html#storylink=cpy